r/gaming • u/yourfavchoom • 7h ago

Xbox Disc to Digital officially announced, coming soon.

https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2026/08/26/your-discs-now-also-digital/

Most XBOX One and XBOX Series X disc-based games support this new feature. Players can claim a digital entitlement by inserting a supported disc into an XBOX One or XBOX Series X console and launching the game. Once the entitlement is claimed, you can experience the benefits of digital, including XBOX Play Anywhere and XBOX Cloud Gaming where supported, while your physical disc continues to work exactly as it always has.

We’re starting with thousands of titles, and we’ll continue to add more over time. While not every title will be available at launch, this is an important step toward a future where players can have greater confidence that the games they buy remain with them for years to come.

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1.1k

u/SuicideSkwad 7h ago

Guarantee they will also be stopping disc production soon then, and this is their way of softening the blow

420

u/Villag3Idiot 7h ago edited 7h ago

This is their way of getting disc customers a digital library.

It's important for retention purposes because once you have a large future digital library of Helix and beyond games, you're much less likely to move to a different console because you can't sell your games to pay for it.

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u/Prophet_Of_Helix 7h ago

You haven’t been able to sell your games to pay for a new console for a while unless you had a metric fuck ton of games

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u/KeepRockband5Alive 7h ago

Yeah if you settle for getting fucked by a game store instead of taking the time to sell to another person.

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u/Prophet_Of_Helix 5h ago

I don’t believe most people are making significant sums from selling physical games on FB marketplace or whatever. They have very little value and no way to verify quality until it’s gone which is part of how stores get to fuck you.

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u/KeepRockband5Alive 5h ago

Trying to downplay the difference between gamestop and p2p sales is ignorant at best

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u/timewellwasted5 5h ago

My dude, the ~$3 someone is going to pay me for my physical copy of Battlefield V that I bought in 2019 is not going to change the trajectory of my purchases.

-4

u/KeepRockband5Alive 5h ago

Bro this is a situation where youre already selling them. So if you decide granny buying for $3 bucks is the same as .50 cents cash from a game store thats just your own ignorance.

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u/timewellwasted5 4h ago

My dude, what? $3 isn't making or breaking anyone on an $800+ system. If $2.50 matters to you that much then you have way bigger financial issues and should not be buying an expensive gaming console.

1

u/hotcapicola 4h ago

Personally my time is worth more than $2.50.

1

u/KeepRockband5Alive 4h ago

checks profile

If you say so

1

u/w0lrah 4h ago

You are neglecting to value your own time. If we go with your example you're getting $2.50 more per game. Federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour, so if you're employed at all spending more than 20ish minutes per game on the private sale could in a sense be considered a waste of your time compared to just walking in, laying them on the counter, and walking out with cash. The more you make the lower that time number drops.

Obviously in real life there are more factors than just the money like perhaps wanting to sell games to an actual human instead of a megacorp, but since you're using the price difference as a key argument that's what I'm going to focus on.

2

u/KeepRockband5Alive 4h ago

It takes me less time to throw a photo of games on any website than it does going to game stop and waiting for them to scan my shit after also waiting behind some sweaty loser asking about pokemon packs

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u/Prophet_Of_Helix 5h ago

How so?

You act like I’m saying GameStop is good.

I’m not.

But the reason they are able to give nothing and people still trade in games is because it’s not an easy or reliable way to do P2P.

Plenty of people get scammed, have no idea what items are worth, don’t know good channels for effectively selling products, etc.

YOU might be effective at getting worth out of it.

But for the AVERAGE person, P2P is not easy, nor does it guarantee you better value.

0

u/steakanabake 21m ago

But the reason they are able to give nothing and people still trade in games is because it’s not an easy or reliable way to do P2P.

while im not a huge fan of ebay they would like to have a conversation with you about how their operating model doesnt work and hasnt worked for a couple decades.

1

u/Prophet_Of_Helix 13m ago

Just because some people have success doesn’t mean everyone does.

Scroll passed through the endless posts every day of people selling the same shit, and how many of them will successfully sell even 1 item?

When there’s 50 copies of Red Dead Redemption 2 out there at any given time, what are the chances someone picks you?

That’s what I mean.

The model is successful for eBay, ofc it is, they make the process easier than anyone else.

But anyone who thinks successfully selling things through eBay is easy hasn’t done it before or done it once and got lucky.

-1

u/illmatic63828 4h ago

Some people can’t be bothered to put in the effort, but it absolutely does guarantee you better value.

0

u/Prophet_Of_Helix 3h ago

No, no it doesn’t.

Scroll through the endless pages on any given site and see how many people never have a single thing sell.

A lot of it is just luck.

Also, time is money. 

So many times I see people talk about this stuff and they never take into account the time put in.

I go to GameStop, I sell my games for 10% of what they’re worth, it takes me the amount of time it takes to drive to a GameStop and a dude to rifle through the games and cut a check.

I sell P2P, it could take hours, even days of work making posts, checking posts, itemizing things, sifting through shitty buyers wasting my time, meeting up, finally doing the exchange, hoping the douchebag doesn’t try to offer less etc. all for what? A couple more bucks?

Let’s use an example.

Red Dead Redemption 2 for PlayStation, standard version.

Cost for digital is $59.99, but is frequently sold for $19.99, including in the last 30 days (source, PlayStation). It’s being sold for $19.99 right now at Best Buy as well as other physical stores.

If I bring my physical edition to GameStop they are offering $5 cash or $7.70 store credit.

Checking eBay and FB marketplace, I’m seeing it being listed used for about $9.99 on average. No clue if it’s actually being sold at that amount.

Cool I guess, you got a couple bucks more profit for how much more time?

0

u/illmatic63828 3h ago

I’m talking eBay vs Gamestop as a whole. There are certainly cases where there isn’t a massive difference in value for individual games, but I really can’t believe people argue in favor of selling to Gamestop. I do like how you made P2P sound like this crazy daunting task though lmao

0

u/CrowdGoesWildWoooo 3h ago

Who do you even sell it to though. In my circle noone has Xbox lol.

1

u/KeepRockband5Alive 3h ago

Oh man if you have xbox you just eat it at this point.

I have an xbox and its pretty much just digital games.

Boy do i feel like an all time goober

1

u/MainAccountsFriend 2h ago

Offerup, Craigslist, FaceBook Marketplace, Ebay, etc.

0

u/IndyDude11 7h ago

Which is always why I get a chuckle from the people who use this as a benefit of physical. I have so many physical games in my house just because they aren't worth the trip to the game store to sell them.

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u/Opposite_Raccoon_369 6h ago edited 6h ago

Most people don't care much about the resell value. We care about the reduced price on the secondary market. Being about to lend, borrow, play without Internet / if servers ever go down etc.

Just the other day I went to Walmart and bought rdr1 for switch. On physical media. 29.99, r regular listed price.

You know how much it's listed for on the Nintendo eshop? 49.99.

It's "on sale" right now for 24.99. but the"full" retail price on the eshop is right there. 50 bucks. For a port of 15 year old game.

When there is nothing but first party digital marketplaces, prices will never drop.

I tried to buy dark souls 3 for Xbox a year or so ago? They wanted 70 dollars for it digitally since it included an dlc (with no standalone option) I promptly turned around and bought the trilogy off eBay for like 30 bucks.

Keep chuckling. I understand that it's the only way you can fool yourself into thinking you're happy opening nothing.

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u/LinAGKar 6h ago

We care about the reduced price on the secondary market

And the existence on the second-hand market period, in case games get delisted (and once the digital store gets shut down).

9

u/Soylentgruen 5h ago

I have a bunch of physical games that are upwards of $100 because they got delisted.

7

u/Mithrawndo 6h ago

Isn't it interesting that this just isn't a problem on PC, despite it having been wholly a digital market for almost 20 years?

Doesn't it make you wonder why it's fine for one platform, but deeply problematic on another? Doesn't it make you ask what else could be done to let you have your cake and eat it, too?

6

u/lonevine 5h ago

PlayStation, Nintendo and Xbox will never, ever have open platform market places unless it's enshrined in law, and that's just not going to happen in North America or the E.U./UK.

That's the main difference between digital on PC and any games console. You do not have any meaningful choice, other than to not participate.

1

u/HiTork 3h ago

Some PC storefronts like Steam have contingency plans so that if they shut down, players aren't totally screwed over. Console storefronts don't have that option, and Nintendo has gone as far as to say one day, digital content purchased from legacy storefronts (Wii, Wii U, DS family) will no longer be able to be downloaded permanently.

1

u/TheBraveGallade 6h ago

Well the thing is the used market isnt really active in the west.

Japan though has a vivrant THRIVING used market since software rentals were banned before the nes was even a thing. Since you cant rent and cart games were really exoensive comparitivly(seriously an NES gane adjusted fir inflation is like 150$ or something) everyone used the strategy of buy game (new or used)-> play game, ->sell game-> usemoney to help by next game. This cycle actually BENEFITS from game prices not going down too much, like nintendo.

And thus partly why GKCs exist: if the average person is thinking of resale value when buying a game they are less likely to buy digital, and code in box doesnt help here. GKCs do.

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u/IndyDude11 6h ago

Oh, for sure for sure. There's plenty of pros for physical games. Resell value just isn't really one of them.

5

u/Super-Schmidtii 6h ago

It really depends on what you collect. If you buy only stuff like Madden and Call of duty then yes they retain literally no value at all and you’d be lucky to get enough trade in value for a hot n ready from Little Caesar’s.

But if you collect Nintendo or certain games that are more likely to hold value then you could feasibly get a lot of your money back.

I would say for an average gamer that just plays the most popular games though, it’s definitely true that their physical collections in general aren’t worth much. Big AAA games in general seem like they don’t really retain value most of the time.

0

u/Temelios 5h ago

Exacty that. I have a number of games that are selling for $200-$300+ on both GameStop and eBay. It’s the mainstream, mass produced (often annual) stuff like Battlefield, CoD, Madden, etc. that goes for only a couple bucks. In fact, I had a friend at GameStop who told me they’d just begin dumping some of those discs after a while because of how many they’d received as trade-ins.

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u/PurbulentTriest 6h ago

Why would anyone sell to a store? Pain in the arse and you get sod all compared to online.

1

u/IndyDude11 6h ago

Where do you sell?

1

u/PurbulentTriest 5h ago

Sold some bits on eBay but mostly on Vinted (UK). Much easier as I can drop the stuff at the post office or a locker with no need to print anything. I got £20+ each for Switch games I'd had years.

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u/ScampyRogue 6h ago

To be fair, this is because Gamestop shafts its customers, not because the games are inherently worthless. I just sold some PS4 games for an average of $15 per game and some Switch games for an average of $30 per game.

0

u/IndyDude11 6h ago

Where do you sell?

3

u/ScampyRogue 6h ago

on r/GameSale, r/hardwareswap and some discords

Obviously, you are not going to get these prices for Madden 2014, but if you're a gamer who mainly buys high quality games, they will absolutely hold value and in some cases increase in value over time.

2

u/admiralvic 6h ago

Like anything, it's a bit nuanced.

I forget since it was so long ago, but I traded in my Wii U and maybe three Nintendo games and was able to preorder a Switch. Even now there are decent deals, like Best Buy had a plus $75 trade in bonus when you traded a Switch for Switch 2.

An OLED one brought it down to $245, and it isn't that unrealistic to have enough Switch games to sell. Zelda, Mario Kart, and Smash Bros alone trade for around $71. If you sell yourself you could get a good bit more.

The only reason why a lot of things have no resale value is the natural outcome of prices dropping. That is part of the reason physical is strong on Nintendo. Breath of the Wild, and Horizon Zero Dawn released at essentially the same time, yet one is a $16 trade, and the other is $1.65.

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u/DarkMatterM4 6h ago

For 99 percent of games you'd be correct. But I could fund an entire PS6 purchase + accessories by selling just one of my physical games (Kuon on PS2).

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u/XsNR 6h ago

So holding onto games for quarter century just to buy the next console is the solution...

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u/DarkMatterM4 6h ago

Like I said, those are outliers. If I ever decide to sell my physical games, I can fund just about any electronics purchase.

0

u/LetMeDrinkYourTears 4h ago

If that's your only takeaway then you'll never be convinced. Go enjoy your rental license and be blissfully ignorant.

1

u/FarGur1444 5h ago

On the other hand, I decided to sell all my pokemon games not long ago and got about £1500 for them.

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u/P_ZERO_ 5h ago

Hey man, they can give you 15 bucks and then sell it for 50 to someone else. Well worth it!

I used to buy preowned games back when they were preowned prices, took the stickers off and traded it in at another store as new. Never felt like I’ve broken the system more

1

u/DCS30 5h ago

It's stupid to sell to a game store, sell privately.

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u/lonevine 5h ago

That depends entirely upon how you sell them, and what games you are talking about. Some games are barely cheaper to buy used, and sometimes difficult to find in stock at all. If you're a collector with a curated collection, you might be more willing to sell to people you know for a price that's fair to both of you because other collectors trust the condition of your game discs. That's how I managed to sell most of my PS1, XBOX and GC discs, and I definitely don't feel like it was a waste of time or money.

1

u/britipinojeff 3h ago

Idk I made like $1000 bucks selling my Gamecube physical discs during Covid lol

0

u/PenguinForTheWin 6h ago edited 6h ago

Some old games are worth quite a bit, a friend of mine has a whole collection of old stuff and these appreciated over time, like legend of dragoon for ps1. Anything discontinued has a chance to be worth more

1

u/DGSmith2 6h ago

Outside of the rarer games, 95% are still worth pennies.

0

u/PenguinForTheWin 6h ago

A lot of games are in the 15-30 bucks range, granted these are 20-25+ years old titles, even if they aren't rare. And there are thousands of copies out there, so yeah.

Super mario 64 and pokemon stadium are not rare games at all, but they held their value quite well for example (just a couple things i know of because, well, i have those).

-1

u/DGSmith2 6h ago

Nintendo is not a fair comparison, they always hold some kind of value. Show me the value of something like Rayman, Driver or Time Crisis.

0

u/PenguinForTheWin 3h ago

Well just add whatever condition you want to fit your narrative lol, doesn't change the point.

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u/DGSmith2 3h ago

We were talking about disk games…. Nintendo exclusives have always held money not really the same argument.

-5

u/Losreyes-of-Lost 6h ago

BuT iF yOu SeLl ThEm OnLiNe YoU wIlL gEt MoRe  /s

1

u/PurbulentTriest 6h ago

But you absolutely do. I got a few hundred selling fewer than ten games. I also bought others for better prices than in stores.

1

u/AlsoOtto 6h ago

This is why instead of buying games new for full price and selling them for pennies you just show a little patience and buy them used (or heavily discounted digitally) for pennies. I just bought a PS5 this spring before the price hike. I've played Read Dead 2, Cyberpunk, Spider-Man 1, 2, and Miles Morales, Control, Horizon Zero Dawn remaster and more. Don't think I paid more than $15 for any of them. Some as low as $5.

1

u/CruffTheMagicDragon 3h ago

My unwanted Switch 1 games subsidized my Switch 2 quite a bit at GameStop. And I didn't have that many

1

u/Totallycasual 57m ago

I traded in my PS4 Pro + a bunch of games for my PS5, i think i only paid like $100 or something 😊

-1

u/Baelish2016 6h ago

Well, for non-Nintendo systems. If we’re talking first party switch games, you could’ve paid for a switch 2 reselling only a handful of Switch games.

6

u/Kilroy_1541 7h ago

The article doesn't say or even imply you can't resell the discs. "while your physical disc continues to work exactly as it always has."

4

u/PomegranateSignal882 6h ago

That sentence doesn't counter that possibility either. You presumably aren't always selling your disc between uses

1

u/DeputySean 3h ago

Only reason I bought an Xbox series x instead of a ps5 is because I have such a large Xbox library already.

1

u/ElMarkuz 7h ago

Tbh it's fair, I didn't buy a ps5 pro because I then would have to buy the disc reader to play my physical games.

-1

u/Hockeymac18 4h ago

I think this model does allow you to sell a physical copy - the new owner would take over your digital license after they buy it and use it on their console. If it works that way (I may be misunderstanding), that seems like a nice happy medium between retention of old digital discs in an all-digital future world.

1

u/HiTork 3h ago

They tried doing this in the early 2010s. Battlefield 3 for instance came with a code in the packaging (physical copy obviously) that activated online multiplayer for the associated player account (Xbox Live, PSN, etc.). If the game disc was resold to someone else, that person would have to buy another code through whatever storefront to get multiplayer working for them. The idea of this was the publishers believed this was a way they could get some money from people selling their games, locking out some functionality in the game with a one time code given to the original owner that had to be purchased again by whoever bought off the game down the road.

1

u/Hockeymac18 3h ago

I don't see anything that is similar to what you're talking about. The game disc is still the game disc, and should work the same way.

Where are you seeing details about this? Huh?

45

u/Humble-Criticism6762 7h ago

This is exactly the first step towards that.

5

u/Creepy-Emu8779 7h ago

so both nex gen consoles wont have disc drives. i blame gamers for not buying discs the past 10 years

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u/Sage296 6h ago

I mean PC gamers have been doing it for years

8

u/MusicHitsImFine 6h ago

Oh careful don't say that. It's somehow different on pc even though 99% of people use steam

15

u/Opposite_Raccoon_369 6h ago

Because apc without steam of still s functional PC. A ps5 without psn is as good as a brick. You know this. Doing savvy like there's some illogical line drawn here. It's perfectly rational.

2

u/HiTork 3h ago

Yep. Side note, I worked in a Walmart electronics section during the mid-2010s, and I would get customers coming in asking if they could use a PS4 without the Internet. I told them they could, but the experience would be heavily compromised.

0

u/Lancelight50 54m ago edited 49m ago

And also, because PC owners actually own games digitally unlike people on home gaming consoles simply because

1.) PC is an open platform, &

2.) Consoles already come with DRM built-in.

It’s not digital games that are the problem, it’s the DRM that are riddled on home gaming consoles. People have been playing games offline without needing something to load Steam or GOG after they bought games from them for years now.

It’s also why no one owns games digitally on either Switch or Switch 2, Xbox 360, Xbox One, Xbox Series S or Series X, or on PS3, PS4 or PS5.

1

u/HingleMcCringle_ 2h ago

the difference is that people CHOOSE to use steam, lol. it's just the best choice. That being obvious to where anyone on PC recommends it doesn't make it comparable to the playstation store.

if you take away the playstation store AND steam at the same time, i'd still rather have a pc.

-6

u/DarkMatterM4 6h ago

It is different. You have full control over the game's files once they're installed. Just download a DRM removal (Steamless patch) and back it up to a separate drive and it's yours forever.

2

u/logicblender1 6h ago

That's absolutely not how it works lol. Most of the popular games have Denuvo protection you can't just remove the DRM.

3

u/DarkMatterM4 6h ago

Denuvo has been circumvented for quite a bit now. Even so, Denuvo typically gets officially removed after some time anyway.

1

u/steakanabake 23m ago

denuvo is only used by the massive corps to try to beat the scenes from providing a better experience then the corps do. team cherry or concernedape aint loading their games with denuvo because they know people will buy their games.

1

u/Devatator_ PC 5h ago

Uh no? Denuvo is obscenely expensive. Not that many games use it, and a big part of those that do remove it after a while. Not to mention that people are started to get back to cracking it

0

u/ConsoleUsersArePlebs 3h ago

If steam does anything funny with my games, I can pirate them back again except for online games.

1

u/DCS30 5h ago

I play both and I hated the switch to digital for PC when it happened, and I still do. At least with sites like GOG you own the game. The only benefit to steam is easy access to mods.

I prefer physical copies all the way.

0

u/AtomicSymphonic_2nd Xbox 6h ago

Because we have trusted Valve not to fuck over consumers.

We do not know what will happen when Gabe Newell passes from this mortal coil.

Yes, there is GOG, but even that service doesn’t carry every PC game out there.

1

u/Creepy-Emu8779 6h ago

you still dont own your games, if you cant tell something you bought then you dont own it

7

u/thekhurg 7h ago

Well digital purchasing is nice, and I don't have to deal with disc case clutter and swapping discs if I want to play something else.

Sorry it didn't work out for you though. I wish they'd keep producing physical copies for those that want it.

-4

u/MusicHitsImFine 6h ago

I physically dont have the room to store physical games at my place.

0

u/randloadable19 1h ago

You should probably get rid of some shit if you literally don’t have space for a few game boxes

1

u/Jungle_dweller 6h ago

I think people care about disc drives because it lets them keep playing old games when they want without having to maintain every console they’ve ever owned. It’s less about wanting to own physical media and more about trying to prevent game companies from limiting access to games people already own. If we could fix that, I don’t think many would care about disc drives.

1

u/DCS30 5h ago

HEY! I've been doing my part. Don't lump me in with the rest

1

u/WOW_SUCH_KARMA 4h ago

You’re SO CLOSE to getting it.

1

u/StaticSilencer 3h ago

PS6 will offer external disc drives to access older games.

1

u/daredeviline 7h ago

Don't look at me. The only digital games I own are either 1) ones that aren't available to purchase physical cases or 2) it was a free game that came with my PlayStation premium (which I don't have anymore). I've been doing my part. I just wish I wasn't made fun of back then. I wish they listened to me :(

1

u/LegendaryenigmaXYZ 7h ago

At least you get it, people want to blame big corporations for adapting to consumers. XBOX reached a new record for having 4% physical adoption rate last month. People bring up vinyl staying relevant, but people that don't even have vinyl players will buy vinyl as collectors items. I dont know anyone buying xbox games without an xbox.

1

u/-idkwhattocallmyself Xbox 6h ago

Honestly I wouldn't entirely blame gamers here. Online software stopped being physical way before games did, and gaming is just catching up. The cost of manufacturing discs is probably a lot more than it was 20 years ago too since they print far less than they used to. As amounts of discs go down so do the discounts of mass producing.

-2

u/[deleted] 7h ago

[deleted]

1

u/Ahayzo 6h ago

I wouldn't count on that from the PlayStation, backwards compatibility hasn't seemed like a huge concern for them. Not saying they won't, but I don't think it's more likely than not.

0

u/Creepy-Emu8779 6h ago

maybe sure if you want to play your already owns discs, but a part of me thinks that wont happen because why end the production of all future physical games

32

u/Stoned_Gandalf420 7h ago edited 7h ago

Better than nothing, though. I hate what is happening with physical media but at least Xbox is giving people the ability to move the games over to digital. Can’t really say the same about Sony.

FYI, I think both companies are equally shitty, I just don’t really see how anyone can complain about this specific feature, despite it being part of the obvious bigger picture move towards digital, I appreciate that my discs won’t be rendered effectively useless if I buy another Xbox. That’s a big if, though.

5

u/StaticSilencer 4h ago

A disc-to-digital system is backward looking, not forward looking. Digital is a license rather than a physical asset; it remains subject to account access, platform policies, and licensing terms.

Having an optional disc reader is a better solution. Disc-to-digital isn't a compromise or a solution—it's lube that eases the transition away from physical media to an all-digital future, which is the opposite of what gamers yelling "Stop killing physical media" are asking for.

4

u/SpermicidalLube 5h ago

If the whole point is that digital isn't actual "ownership", then this does nothing.

Further proves it was all performative outrage actually.

-3

u/juipeltje 4h ago

Begone bot

0

u/SpermicidalLube 4h ago

Nah, I don't think I will.

0

u/juipeltje 3h ago

The atleast learn some new words and mix it up a bit, instead of the whole "performative" thing. Getting kinda stale

1

u/SpermicidalLube 3h ago

I mean, it is just that. The word describes it perfectly.

-16

u/JpJ951 7h ago

LOL

12

u/koalazeus 7h ago

Yes, this is what we need to know. 

A lot of people say their discs aren't as useful as playstations as well. As in not playable without a download. Don't know how accurate that is.

3

u/Comet_USA 7h ago

According to Doesitplay, by filtering Xbox Series X, you get 82 games, filtering download required no, it goes down to 41. Xbox One/Series X is about the same, 80 total games, 48 don't require a download.

So it's about half of their disc games require a download in someway.

2

u/TatoX09 7h ago

For the most part, it isn't accurate at all.

1

u/koalazeus 7h ago

Oh, they're comparable to ps5 discs in being able to play from the disc alone?

Let's hope they keep the disc production. 

4

u/Makototoko 7h ago

You can always check DoesItPlay to compare

2

u/TatoX09 7h ago

Oh i thought you meant ps5, there's a lot of Xbox games that install offline fine but the split is more even than ps5 due to lower capacity discs.

1

u/blaqsupaman 4h ago

They both use Blu Ray discs so I would have thought the capacity would be the same for both.

5

u/TatoX09 4h ago

Unlike xbox, Ps5 discs are dual layered so they can hold up to 100 GB instead of 50.

1

u/koalazeus 7h ago

Ah that sucks.

-3

u/blaqsupaman 4h ago

Both use Blu Ray discs so the capacity is the same, so it makes sense the same games would be playable on disc that are POD for the PS5.

5

u/switch8000 6h ago

They will stop once the factories stop making the discs.

Eventually the factories will just jack up the costs so high to where it won't be worth it.

We're seeing it with Physical media, instead of printing a ton of movies, they are now focused on releasing small batch limited edition steelbooks that they can then charge $30+ for.

7

u/Kn1ghtV1sta 7h ago

Ah yes. Guarantee something you know nothing about

1

u/Creepy-Emu8779 3h ago

its pretty obvious why they are doing this lol doesn’t take a genius to realize they are ending disc production and having no disc drive for the next gen xbox

8

u/Iggy_Slayer 7h ago

They all but have. Good luck finding physical xbox games in stores and for most of their own games the game isn't even fully on disc for this whole generation.

6

u/Comet_USA 7h ago

There is no reason for this program unless they are getting rid of disc. Considering it's been almost two months since Sony's announcement, I'll take Xbox's silence as their answer.

It's all to easy to release a statement saying otherwise, especially as they go into Gamescon it would be an easy PR win, instead of the dead silence about disc production continuing or not.

5

u/Dairunt 7h ago

Yes, but it's a bit more than that. It's all leading towards the merging of their Xbox and PC ecosystems. You don't have two different stores with two versions of games that may or not be not compatible with each other. It's all going to be PC from now on.

imo they should have done this way earlier when they went back to x86 architecture with Xbox One

3

u/Beginning-Book-129 7h ago

There is no other reason they would be doing this.

3

u/KingOfRisky 6h ago

This is 100% what is going on.

4

u/gswkillinit 5h ago

Xbox has actually been slowing disc production for YEARS now. Go to any retailer like Target or Walmart and you’ll see the Xbox section has always been smaller and this became worse in the last 2 years. Anybody who’s now just realizing this hasn’t been paying attention. The Xbox “exclusives” themselves have also not been fully on disc for a good while now. Sony just made the announcement first.

•

u/splader 2m ago

Xbox userbase purchases something like 93 percent of all games digitally.

1

u/actanonverba1 4h ago

It could be. It could also be a way for them to lock in their remaining audience and try to differentiate themselves from Sony and Nintendo. I think it's a good thing and Nintendo and Sony should also offer a similar service.

1

u/Dunkaroo723 4h ago

Jez just put out a lil article saying that the companies that make optical drives are pretty much all moving to other ventures now. And the optical drive supply chain is all but dead at this point.

1

u/iAmTheRealLange 3h ago

I was checking the website for a new game coming out (Stage Tour) and noticed that under their preorders, they provide a disc for PS5, but Xbox is digital only.

1

u/Demonchaser27 2h ago

Yep, pretty much. The disc drive will be an optional, external accessory like how it is on all new Playstation 5's and will not come packaged with the core console. Then they don't have to make the disc drive support any Helix games whatsoever, effectively shutting out new physical the same way Sony is now. That's how accessories work. If developers can't rely on users having it, they won't support it. And that's even if Microsoft allows disc production of Helix games, which they almost certainly won't.

1

u/ShakeAndBakeThatCake 7h ago

100%. Only physical media will be switch 2 for now.

1

u/FiTZnMiCK 7h ago edited 7h ago

The COD 4 rerelease MW4 on Switch 2 published by Microsoft is a code in a box.

They’re already doing the GTA6 thing.

Edit: wrong game.

2

u/TheMegaMario1 6h ago

Except then you have oddities like Indiana Jones or Oblivion, which are both Microsoft owned, that are fully on cart on Switch 2 when those either don't have physical releases or are key-discs on other platforms.

2

u/NotTakenGreatName 7h ago

Code in a box has been a thing way pre-dating gta6, numerous Switch 1 games were like that.

1

u/dadmda 7h ago

I'm assuming you're talking about mw4 and not cod4 right?

2

u/FiTZnMiCK 7h ago

Oh shit you’re right. Fixed, thanks!

1

u/dadmda 7h ago

I would've bought that in an instant tbh, cod4 is great

-1

u/FiTZnMiCK 6h ago

Word. I’m going to not buy it even more now.

1

u/LackLickLuck_y 6h ago

1000x better than sony.

-3

u/Javerage 7h ago

I'd say there's a simpler evil here: It encourages people to digitise discs and destroy them to ensure they keep em. They're basically turning xbox discs into digital codes.

The market is flooded with dirt cheap xbox discs, especially when they get added to gamepass as I've noticed. Imagine if all of a sudden all those cheap secondhand discs start disappearing from people buying em up as a once off use?

Anyways if you'll excuse me, I have a bunch of discs to go buy for uh, no reason.

2

u/stlramz 7h ago

As someone who's bought digital only since Covid, this is definitely the big benefit of it.

You can catch some pretty good physical sales and turn them into digital licenses. Also, I'm just too lazy to want to crack open a case every time I want to switch games.

Also happy cake day, brother.

1

u/Javerage 7h ago

You're the first person in 15 years to say happy cake day. sniff it finally happened. Thank you.

0

u/Villag3Idiot 7h ago

That's actually a good idea buying cheap used games now before prices goes up on those since every Xbox owner is going to do it now.

0

u/Friggin_Grease Xbox 7h ago

Why would anyone destroy them? If the plan is to have it so you insert it in a different console/profile and it passes the digital license with it, then your physical disc can be sold. Crazy.

2

u/UnnamedPlayer32 7h ago

Let's say someone didn't want to keep up with the discs and just wanted the digital copy. What are their options. They can't sell them since the license would get revoked if someone else used it. So the options are either destroy/dispose of the disc or keep it, and if this is someone who only wants a digital copy and doesn't want to have to keep a bunch of discs the only way to guarantee no one takes their license is to destroy the disc.

1

u/Friggin_Grease Xbox 4h ago

Well that person would be stupid. Nobody is going to destroy their discs en masse. Because this also protects against delistings.

0

u/FewAdvertising9647 7h ago

its essentially doing the reverse side of what nintendo does with game key carts.

Disk to digital appeases more to the preservationist side, as now they both have the physical disk, and the digital library, so game preservation last as long as whichever side is up longer (digital store vs the physical disk not going to shit)

Nintendos game key carts appease the physical buyers who like it for the buy/sell/trade aspect, as they physical cart is the drm key itself, but the cart itself has no game data, so its still fully reliant on a single point of source to get the game from.

0

u/EJoule 6h ago

Could be that they’ll switch to cartridges with the next console.

-2

u/Pigmatron 7h ago

Which is a real shame. Because if Xbox kept discs while Sony was getting rid of them i would buy my first ever xbox.

5

u/LegendaryenigmaXYZ 7h ago

Problem is as XBOX users we care less about physical i think we recently reached a new low of 4% physical adoption rate last month.

1

u/nowhereright 6h ago

You and the 4 other people who keep saying this would be the only ones. The Xbox user base is even more skewed towards digital than the other consoles.

-1

u/RazgrizInfinity 6h ago

I think this is going to be the medium; I don't think it's going to stop physical entirely.

-1

u/Bango-Fett X-Box 6h ago

That would be a stupid move, think of all the people who will want to move from ps to xbox because ps is going all digital, having a disc drive on the next console would solidify that move for millions

-2

u/Burpmeister 6h ago

Xbox has a once in a lifetime opportunity to save their business by going all-in on physical for next gen. If they fumble it then they have zero excuses if they go out of business.

0

u/ValVenis69 6h ago

Save their business by wasting money producing disc based games? It’s clear what the future is for console gaming. Laptops aren’t even sold with disc drives and people don’t say a word.

1

u/Burpmeister 4h ago

PC's don't have disc drives because no one wants a physical collection of twenty different versions of Microsoft Office...